


it's fire, it's freedom, it's flooding open

by braille_upon_my_skin



Series: the world we're gonna make [2]
Category: The Greatest Showman (2017)
Genre: M/M, Mild warning for injuries and violence.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-06
Updated: 2018-02-06
Packaged: 2019-03-14 18:24:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13595784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/braille_upon_my_skin/pseuds/braille_upon_my_skin
Summary: "Phillip's eyes, bluer than the sea beyond the docks, flicker from W.D. to Barnum in a stunned sort of disbelief, before closing as his head falls, limp, to the ground."





	it's fire, it's freedom, it's flooding open

**Author's Note:**

> I really should watch this movie, again, before writing more stories set in its universe, but I simply cannot help myself. I'm in love with this circus family and its "bisexual circus dads", as the fandom has taken to calling them.

 

 

\---

 

He had to piece together what had happened from the scattered fragments offered to him.

No two stories are alike. Lettie's account differs from Charles's, and O'Malley and The Irish Giant have details and embellishments that contrast from everything else that Barnum heard.

The only thing he knew for certain, was that he arrived to the tents and caravans at a break-neck pace to find the remnants of what had been an angry mob scattering, police standing between his family of outcasts and furiously shouting protestors, his eardrums assailed by a discordant blast of police whistles and yelling from all parties, and Phillip Carlyle and W.D. Wheeler at the center of a circle formed by the circus troupe.

A _protective_ circle, Barnum soon realizes, for W.D.'s knuckles are bruised and split open, likely having left one hell of a welt on an attacker's face, and Phillip is lying down, clutching at his side. His eyes, bluer than the sea beyond the docks, flicker from W.D. to Barnum in a stunned sort of disbelief, before closing as his head falls, limp, to the ground. 

Around Barnum, cries of distress rise up, and he does all that he can to quiet them with reassurances.

"Sons of bitches," Charles spits derisively at the men retreating, their forms no bigger than ants on the horizon line.

"Gutless cowards," Lettie agrees, looking ready to chase them down and enact her own form of justice.

Though Barnum concurs _vehemently_ , all of his attention is on tending to his partner, who is lying unconscious in a puddle that reeks of sour whiskey and stagnant water. "Back inside, all of you," he instructs. He takes Phillip into his arms, brushing a hand over his forehead to check that the old wound hasn't been reopened during the struggle. "They won't get away with this," he swears, his blood blistering hot with fury. His friends and family have been hurt one too many times by a hateful assortment of people unable to handle anything different, anything special. "I assure you."

"Here, here!" Charles shouts.

Similar exclamations echo around him.

The air pulsing with rage, everyone clusters behind Barnum and follows him into the safety of the main tent as Phillip's still form dangles, once again, from his arms.

 

.x.

 

It is a thoroughly unpleasant shock to find _blood_ seeping through Phillip's shirt.

Barnum tears the garment open without hesitation, not allowing himself even a moment to linger on the fact that this will be his first time seeing the younger man in a state of partial undress. His eyes sweep diligently over the stretch of Phillip's artfully sculpted torso and abdomen until they zero in on a wound carved into his side.

One inflicted by a _knife_.

Anne Wheeler, the young trapeze artist with whom Phillip had struck up an almost immediate rapport, stands at Barnum's shoulder, her lithe form tense with fear. She lets out a strangled gasp as the wound is revealed.

Lettie is beside her, laying a comforting arm on the girl's shoulder.

"H-Hospital," Barnum stammers, his throat tightening as the world is ripped out from under his feet. His stomach flips end over end and hysteria simmers just under the surface, threatening to capsize his heart. He can no longer control the volume of his voice as he calls, hoarsely, staggering, almost swaying, "We have to get him to a hospital!"

 

.x.

 

Handing Phillip off, entrusting him to a doctor's care, is even more painful the second time around. Having to leave him with only Anne Wheeler at his bedside takes every ounce of strength that Barnum can summon.

But, his business with the circus is not over.

 His gait is a march, spurred by hellish rage. He approaches the front desk at the police station and announces without any preamble, "My business partner, Phillip Carlyle, was stabbed during an outbreak of violence outside of my circus. That's twice, now, that your officers have failed to protect my performers."

The chief of police sizes him up, a mixture of shock and very thinly veiled derision behind his features. "Mr. Barnum," he drawls, "we cannot possibly be expected to station officers outside of your tents at all hours of the day and night. It's simply out of the question."

"I say we take matters into our own hands."

Brows furrowing, the chief of police leans over his desk to locate the source of the third voice. He finds Charles, and a look of distinct confusion overtakes his face.

His neck panning up to take in The Irish Giant, the wicked grin on the face of The Lord of Leeds, and the near-demonic visage of Prince Constantine, only deepens the confusion until it takes on the form of a subtle but detectable fear.

 "If we can't rely on your boys to keep us safe, why not give those sorry bastards the fight they're looking for?" Charles goes on. "It would be my _pleasure_ to drive my sword into the spineless weasel who knifed Ringmaster Number Two."

Face white as the paperwork on his desk, obviously petrified at the thought of P.T. Barnum's compendium of aberrations running the streets to exact vigilante justice, the chief of police stutters, "I-I'll see what I can arrange."

A sliver of a smile works its way across Barnum's face. It's a small victory, paltry in the face of the larger matter at hand, but a victory all the same. He turns to the younger man at his knee and says kindly, "At ease, General."

 

.x.

 

Lettie is right there as he sinks into the chair in the office, his hands clasped tightly enough to turn his knuckles white. "You should be there for him," she says.

Barnum remains silent. He remembers all too clearly Phillip's arm, _slack_ , the strength distressingly _absent_ from his swell of muscle, slipping from around his neck as he laid the younger man on the ground; his desperate search of Phillip's vitals for _any_ signs of life. His heart had never hammered so fast, never felt so heavy. He thought he might be sick, and not from the smoke lingering in his lungs.

That queasiness returns with a vengeance. His pulse hammers. He considers the extent of the damage, and _prays_ that the blade didn't pierce anything critical.

"He's your boy, isn't he?"

At those words, Barnum jerks his head up and out of his anguish to meet the bearded woman's eyes with his own. "How did you… ?"

"Woman's intuition is a powerful force, hon," Lettie replies, a hint of a smirk pulling at her mouth.

Barnum's pulse skips, his blood icing over. If only for Phillip's sake, he is prepared to swear Lettie to secrecy, when it occurs to him just _who_ she is.

This is Lettie Lutz; the woman who hid a glorious, earthmoving singing voice behind hanging bedsheets in the most secluded corner of a warehouse, out of fear of showing her face and enduring goring jeers and rejection. She, like every other performer, every other attraction, _knows_ what it is to be born a deviation from the world around her.

No stones of judgement will be cast from her hands.

"I _should_ see him," Barnum agrees, beholding Lettie with a new sense of appreciation. _Fondness_.

"You're damn right you should." She all but shoves him out of the office and he feels the mischievous twinkle in her eye at his back as the door swings shut behind him.

 

.x.

 

"Ever since you waltzed into my life, it's begun to feel more and more like the maudlin writings of a starry-eyed schoolboy."

The rich, velvety cadence flowing sweetly into his ears would be enough to send Barnum's heart into the atmosphere, miles and miles above the earth. The affectionate prodding could pull him right to the side of the cot to take its occupant into a bone-crushing embrace.

It is the sight of Phillip Carlyle sitting upright, eyes focused and alert, bright, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, very much and indisputably _alive_ , that has Barnum choking on the intense burst of exuberance in his chest.

Anne Wheeler politely steps aside, wearing a small, amused smile, and Barnum rushes to Phillip's bedside in long strides that turn quickly into bounds. He places a hand on either side of the younger man's striking face, unable to contain his smile, and making no effort to. The nurses, doctors, and their sensibilities be damned.

"It was never my intention to cast you as the damsel in need of rescuing," he says.

"With the size of your ego, I'm not certain I believe you," Phillip responds cheekily. His eyes sweep over Barnum's, shining with a voluminous rush of emotions that he cannot mask. Or, perhaps he isn't trying, either. He raises a hand and lays it over Barnum's appendage where it rests against his cheek. 

The magnitude of his relief has Barnum's insides shuddering with the suppression of a sob. He wouldn't begin to know what to do if he was never again on the receiving end of one of Phillip's caustic and irreverent, but always hailing from a place of deepest admiration, remarks.

Touching his nose to Phillip's is as intimate of a gesture as he dares out in the open, but his thumb caressing the ridge of Phillip's cheekbone, and Phillip's unbridled smile, promise _so much more_ when they have a moment to themselves.

 

.x.

 

He returns to the tents and approaches W.D. Wheeler on legs that feel more like jelly than muscle and bone. "You saved Phillip," he says, uncaring about disguising the quaver in his voice. Anne Wheeler and the rest of the troupe were absolutely, completely adamant on that. It was the one consistent detail throughout all of their stories.

The trapeze artist eyes him. His hand is wound in a bandage, but he is otherwise none the worse for wear. Thankfully. "He was willing to risk his life for my sister," he says plainly. "It was the least I could do."

Barnum reaches out, laying a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "Thank you," he almost whispers, all of him too off-balance to manage much else. "I owe you a world of gratitude."

W.D.'s eyebrow arches, but he says nothing to confirm any suspicions that he might have about the nature of the relationship between the two ringmasters.

 

.x.

 

Outside the tent, the clomping of horses' hooves and growls of the lions as the performers rehearse for the show, tomorrow, lace the air. The briny scent rolling off of the ocean fills Phineas Barnum's nose. He blocks all of this out to focus on Phillip Carlyle as the younger man stands before him, newly released from the hospital after a two day stay.

"This is for you," Barnum says. He extends a covered basket to Phillip, who takes it with curiosity creasing his brow-line. "Charity and the girls put it together."

Phillip lifts up the cover and peruses the items inside, which Barnum takes it upon himself to helpfully explain are: "A can of hearty soup and a loaf of fresh baked bread, lovingly prepared by Charity, assorted candies chosen by Helen, to make absolute certain you were given the _best_ the store had to offer, and a book- one of Caroline's favorites, hand-picked from her personal library."

Phillip's mouth opens, but no sound comes out.

A verbal response is unnecessary. The awe shining in his eyes says everything for him.

"The doctors said it was a superficial wound," Barnum carries on, saving Phillip from the embarrassment of his tied-up tongue, "and should heal within a few weeks' time. I'll be taking over ringleader duties until then."

"I… would expect nothing less," Phillip says at long last. He holds the basket close to him, as if it is something precious and worth treasuring.

Barnum wonders if Phillip's parents gave him any such parcels during or after either of his stays in the hospital. It seems as though the Carlyles have hardly any role in their son's life at all.

He opts to stow the inquiries away, for the moment, realizing that there must be a _reason_ for Phillip's conspicuous silence when it comes to the people who raised him. And, that badgering him about the subject would be needlessly taxing.

As an alternative, he rests a hand on the side of Phillip's neck and runs it down the length of his torso to trace the stitches sewing shut the incision between his ribcage and pelvis, over the material of his shirt.

Phillip sucks in a breath, his eyelashes fluttering as his eyelids lower to hood his eyes. "You visited me, before, didn't you?" A hope he would never admit to underlines the query.

"Of course," Barnum assures him. No force on Earth, in Heaven, or in Hell, could have kept him away. He traces a final line of stitching, then lifts his hand to squeeze softly at Phillip's neck, bending to bring their faces together.

It is Phillip, however, who closes off the distance. He surges forward, his lips insistent, his kisses hungry. Barnum meets them with equal insistency, just as famished, pressing into the basket as it is suspended in the non-existent space between their chests. He breaks off with a bite to Phillip's lower lip, and drags his teeth teasingly over the supple flesh.

A wanton sound issues from Phillip's mouth.

"And, _something else_ can wait until you've recovered, as well," Barnum says, knowing that there is a devilish glimmer in his eye.

Phillip's eyes open wide. He gapes, then lets out a choking sound. "I'm not sure what you mean," he splutters.

The blush rising to color his face tells a different story.

"You'll have to find out, then, won't you?" Barnum husks. He closes his fingers over Phillip's to wrap them around the handle of the basket, then lays a last, lingering kiss on Phillip's jaw- an incentive for him to stay safe, to stay _alive_ , so that another one of his walls can be broken down. As he pulls away, he stares into Phillip's eyes, relishing the glaze over them, the intrigue burning behind them. A curiosity and desire that _beg_ to be sated.

And, will be. In due time.

A smirk unfurling across his face, Barnum whirls on his heels to reenter the tent, leaving a stupefied and _flustered_ Phillip to break out of his trance and follow him; reeled in, just as before, by the prospect of something new, something greater, something beyond what he ever could have imagined. 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
